Jamie says: I took my own advice. I tried one a new fruit or vegetable. (In my case, it was a veggie.)

Roasted White Sweet Potatoes with Crushed Rosemary

Meet Mr. White Sweet Potato. He’s mildly sweet and has the texture of a sweet potato but looks a little more like your Idaho potato in color.

Meet Mr. White Sweet Potato!

I brought the ketchup to the table, but totally forgot it was there (meaning, it was so good on it’s own that ketchup would . I served it with the Balsamic-Glazed Roasted Asparagus with Crumbled Blue Cheese (blog post to come) and then it advanced from amazing to amazing times a million!

The only thing better? Serving it with Balsamic-Glazed Roasted Asparagus with Crumbled Blue Cheese.

Roasted White Sweet Potatoes with Crushed Rosemary

Ingredients:

1 medium organic white sweet potato

1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil

dash coarse sea salt

dash freshly ground pepper

dash crushed rosemary

Directions:

Preheat oven to 365F. Cut potato into 1/4″ slices. Chop slices into pieces of equal size. Place in a baking dish.

Jamie says: My prize for the Cigna recipe contest came in the mail last week! I used the Williams Sonoma rub for the first time on this recipe. It was absolutely fabulous! If you’ve never tried tofu before, now’s the time…

Drain tofu. Wrap it in paper towels and place on a plate. Set heavy pots and pans on top to further drain tofu. Let sit for 30 minutes. Remove paper towels and slice tofu into thirds (sandwich-style). Stack pieces back together and slice into thirds to create 9 pieces of tofu.

Heat a large pan on medium heat. Pour canola oil in pan. Add tofu slices. Cook for about 4 minutes or until light golden brown.

Flip tofu with a heat-resistant spatula and add leeks and bell pepper. Place a lid on top of the pan and cook for about 4 more minutes or until leeks and bell pepper are soft and lightly brown. Remove lid and add slices of cheese on top. Sprinkle with rub and serve.

Yield: 9 pieces of tofu with veggies

Serves: 3

Serving suggestion: Serve with little pieces of bread to make a few mini sandwiches.

Nutrition note: Tofu is a non-meat source of protein and comes from soybeans.

Jamie says: I hit the nail on the head with this one. The recipe is a combo between 1) a madeover throw-back to the Poppyseed Pancakes with Spiced Clementines (from the cookbook we gave my Mom years ago for Christmas) that my mom used to make us as kids and 2) the hearty pumpkin pancakes I made K when she spent the weekend here.

Coat pan with no stick cooking spray and pour 1/2 of pancake batter onto pan to make three pancakes. Cook until bubbles stop forming and bottom of pancake is golden brown, about 1 1/2 minutes. Flip to cook other side and cook until golden brown, about 1 minute. Place on a serving plate. Repeat once more using remaining batter.

Nutrition note: Chia seeds pack in fiber (so does the pumpkin and pancake mix), and add omega-3s, vitamins, and minerals like calcium. Pumpkin also adds vitamin A. And the clementines are a vitamin C knock-out.

Jamie says: My inspiration for this dish started with a recipe (Pumpkin Shrimp Curry– you can see I didn’t go the pumpkin route) and my desire to try foods from different cultures. I’ve been curious to experiment cooking with coconut milk- and here is my creation: Creamy Curry Butternut Squash Soup with Shrimp. The curry and squash made it quite colorful and very flavorful. The dish provides a fresh take on squash.

Creamy Curry Butternut Squash Soup with Shrimp

The butternut squash combined with the lite coconut milk gave the soup just the right amount of creaminess. Let’s just say I was looking forward to the leftovers the next day…

Preheat oven to 350°F. Cut butternut squash in half. Place cut-side down in a pan filled with about 1/2 inch of water. Roast until tender about 40 minutes. Allow to slightly cool. Use a spoon to scoop squash from skin. Mash in a bowl with a fork. (You can do this step ahead of time and refrigerate or freeze and defrost the squash.)

In a small/medium pot, add rice blend and 2 cups water. Bring water to a boil, stir, reduce heat to medium-low, and cover with a lid and cook for 18 minutes. Remove from heat. (Rice can also be cooked ahead of time and refrigerated or frozen and defrosted).